Nemonte Nenquimo

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Nemonte Nenquimo is an Indigenous activist and member of the Waorani Nation from the Amazonian Region of Ecuador. She is the first female president of the Waorani of Pastaza (CONCONAWEP) and co-founder of the Indigenous-led nonprofit organization Ceibo Alliance. In 2020, she was named in the Time 100 list of the 100 most influential people in the world, the only Indigenous woman on the list and the second Ecuadorian to ever be named in its history. In recognition of her work, in 2020 the United Nations Environment Programme gave her the "Champions of the Earth" award in the category Inspiration and Action. [1]

Contents

Nenquimo was the plaintiff in a lawsuit against the Ecuadorian government, which culminated in a 2019 ruling that protects half a million acres of Waorani ancestral land in the Amazon rainforest from oil drilling.

Early life and career

Nenquimo was born in the community of Nemompare in 1985 in the Pastaza region of the Ecuadorian Amazon. [2] [3] She is a member of the Waorani Nation of hunter-harvesters. [4]

In 2014, Nenquimo co-founded Ceibo Alliance, an Indigenous-led nonprofit to protect Indigenous lands from resource extraction. She was elected the first female president of the Waorani organization of Pastaza province (CONCONAWEP) in 2018. [3] [5] [6] [7]

Activism

Nenquimo has expressed a love for her land going back generations. Her community, the Waorani Nation, were first colonized in 1958 by Christian missionaries. [8]   Soon after in the 1960s, the Ecuadorian government, driven by oil, began building roads and destroying their forest. [8]   The government has also divided Waorani land to be auctioned for oil extraction. [8]   Most of the Ecuadorian Amazon has been affected by this, with six of the blocks auctioned to oil companies belonging to the Waorani. [8]   One of these blocks is Nemompare, Nenquimo’s birthplace. [8]   As a result, the Waorani people have been forced to moved further into the forest in a fight to remain independent from the outside world. [8] [9]

Nemonte Nenquimo says that her people have felt the effects of climate change long before it became a mainstream conversation. [8]   She has also stated that abuelas (elderly Waorani women) have provided her with the knowledge and passion to fight for change. [8] [10] [9]  

2019 court ruling

Location of Yasuni National Park and Waorani land in Ecuador Localizacion de Yasuni y Huaorani en Ecuador.svg
Location of Yasuní National Park and Waorani land in Ecuador

The Ecuadorian Amazon Rainforest is home to many indigenous people. [11] Many often claim that their rights, access to their land, and ability to make decisions has been ignored by the government. [11] As a result, as part of CONCONAWEP (Coordinating Council of the Waorani Nationality of Ecuador-Pastaza), Nenquimo co-filed a lawsuit with Ecuador’s human rights ombudsmen against the Ecuadorian government. [4] [12] Nenquimo was the plaintiff in the lawsuit, whose 2019 ruling by a three-judge panel of the Pastaza Provincial Court protects half a million acres of the Amazon rainforest in Ecuador from oil drilling. [5] [4] [3] The verdict that the Ecuadorian government must engage in the free, prior and informed consent process according to the standards of international law and the Constitutional Court of Ecuador before auctioning land provides a legal precedent for other Indigenous nations to counteract resource extraction within Indigenous territory. [3] [12]

A parade of hundreds of Waorani people celebrated the ruling in April 2019 in Puyo, the regional capital of the eastern province of Pastaza. Many traveled great distances to attend. [12]

Current work

Nemonte Nenquimo, along with her husband Mitch Anderson (founder of Amazon Frontlines) is set to publish a book We Will Not Be Saved in June 2024. [13] [14] In this memoir, she confronts the racist perceptions of Indigenous people with a dive into oral history to demonstrate not only her life story but also that of the Amazon. [14]

Awards

In 2020, she was featured on the Time 100 list, the only Indigenous woman that year and among the first Amazonians ever to be named. [3] She was also on the list of the BBC's 100 Women announced on 23 November 2020. [15] In 2020, Nenquimo was one of six environmental leaders to be awarded the Goldman Environmental Prize. [16] [17] [18] [19]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Huaorani people</span> Indigenous people in Ecuador

The Huaorani, Waorani, or Waodani, also known as the Waos, are an Indigenous people from the Amazonian Region of Ecuador who have marked differences from other ethnic groups from Ecuador. The alternate name Auca is a pejorative exonym used by the neighboring Quechua natives, and commonly adopted by Spanish-speakers as well. Auca means 'savage'.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sápara</span> Indigenous people native to the Amazon rainforest

The Sápara, also known as Zápara or Záparo, are an indigenous people native to the Amazon rainforest along the border of Ecuador and Peru. They once occupied some 12,000 mi² between the Napo River and the Pastaza. Early in the 20th century, there were some 200,000 Zapara. From the year 2009 on the Ecuadorian Zápara call themselves Sápara. The official name is Nación Sápara del Ecuador (NASE). It means Sápara Nation of Ecuador. The president of this nation is Klever Ruiz. The Sápara Nation was officially registered by CONDENPE – the Council of Development of the nationalities and peoples of Ecuador – on September 16, 2009. The current name of the organisation is the result of a unification process of upriver and downriver communities. There was a conflict between these different groups about their authentic ethnic identity in the last years of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century. With this unification this conflict seems to be solved. CONDENPE confirms as well officially the legal status of autonomy or self-government of the Sápara Nation of Ecuador N.A.S.E. and confirms their territory between the rivers Pindoyacu, Conambo and Alto Corrientes in the province of Pastaza. It is confirmed as well that the head office of NASE is the city of Shell, Pastaza.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Yasuní National Park</span> National park in Ecuador

Yasuní National Park is a protected area comprising roughly 10,000 km2 (3,900 sq mi) between the Napo and Curaray Rivers in Pastaza and Orellana Provinces within Amazonian Ecuador. The national park lies within the Napo moist forests ecoregion and is primarily rain forest. The park is about 250 km (160 mi) from Quito and was designated a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve along with the adjacent Waorani Ethnic Reserve in 1989. It is within the ancestral territory of the Huaorani indigenous people. Yasuní is also home to two uncontacted indigenous tribes, the Tagaeri and the Taromenane. Many indigenous people use the riverways within the park as a main mode of travel. Several waterways in the area are tributaries that lead into the Amazon River, including blackwater rivers high in tannins boasting vastly different floral composition than the main riverways. The spine-covered palm, Bactrisriparia, and aquatic plant Montrichardia linifera typically line the edges of these slow moving rivers, often referred to as Igapós.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sarayaku</span>

Sarayaku is a territory and a village situated by the Bobonaza River in the province of Pastaza in the southern part of el Oriente, the Amazonic region of Ecuador. The territory incorporates a number of villages.

The Waorani (Huaorani) language, commonly known as Sabela is a vulnerable language isolate spoken by the Huaorani people, an indigenous group living in the Amazon rainforest between the Napo and Curaray Rivers in Ecuador. A small number of speakers with so-called uncontacted groups may live in Peru.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Puyo, Pastaza</span> City in Pastaza Province, Ecuador

Puyo, also known as El Puyo, is the capital of Pastaza, a province in Ecuador. Puyo is located at an altitude of approximately 950 metres above sea level by the Puyo River, a tributary of the Pastaza River, which eventually leads into the Amazon River. True to its name, derived from the Kichwa word for "cloudy", the local climate is a wet one and the weather is often overcast.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amazon Watch</span> US-based nonprofit organization

Amazon Watch is a nonprofit organization founded in 1996, and based in Oakland, California, it works to protect the rainforest and advance the rights of indigenous peoples in the Amazon Basin. It partners with indigenous and environmental organizations in Ecuador, Peru, Colombia and Brazil in campaigns for human rights, corporate accountability and the preservation of the Amazon's ecological systems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Amazonian Kichwas</span> Group of people indigenous to the Ecuadorian Amazon

Amazonian Kichwas are a grouping of indigenous Kichwa peoples in the Ecuadorian Amazon, with minor groups across the borders of Colombia and Peru. Amazonian Kichwas consists of different ethnic peoples, including Napo Kichwa and Canelos Kichwa. There are approximately 419 organized communities of the Amazonian Kichwas. The basic socio-political unit is the ayllu. The ayllus in turn constitute territorial clans, based on common ancestry. Unlike other subgroups, the Napo Kichwa maintain less ethnic duality of acculturated natives or Christians.

The Yasuní-ITT Initiative was a project that attempted to keep over a billion barrels of oil in the ground under the Yasuni National Park in the Ecuadorian Amazon. The initiative was launched in 2007 by Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa and offered a perpetual suspension of oil extraction from the Ishpingo-Tambococha-Tiputini oil field (ITT) in return for $3.6 billion from the international community.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alicia Cawiya</span>

Alicia Cawiya or Cahuiya is the vice-president of the Huaorani Nation of Ecuador and one of the leaders of the movement against oil exploitation in her region. In 2013, she made a speech in Ecuador's parliament to protect the Amazon basin from oil companies.

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References

  1. ↑ Environment, U. N. (9 December 2020). "Nemonte Nenquimo". Champions of the Earth. Retrieved 24 December 2020.
  2. ↑ Zúñiga, Cecilia (24 September 2020). "Ya basta de encender fuegos en la selva amazónica, dice la líder waorani Nemonte Nenquimo, una de las 100 personas más influyentes del mundo para la revista Time". El Universo.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 Pinchetti, Sophie (26 April 2019). "Waorani People Win Landmark Legal Victory Against Ecuadorian Government". Amazon Frontlines.
  4. 1 2 3 Pinchetti, Sophie (23 September 2020). "Indigenous Amazonian Leader Nemonte Nenquimo Is Named TIME 100 Most Influential People In The World". Amazon Frontlines.
  5. 1 2 DiCaprio, Leonardo (22 September 2020). "The 100 Most Influential People of 2020: Nemonte Nenquimo". TIME.
  6. ↑ Specter, Emma (14 October 2019). "These Indigenous Activists Are Fighting for the Future of a Ravaged Amazon". Vogue.
  7. ↑ Nenquimo, Nemonte (20 October 2020). "This is my message to the western world – your civilisation is killing life on Earth". The Guardian.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 León, Carolina Loza. "'We saw it coming': The Indigenous leader fighting climate change". www.aljazeera.com. Retrieved 17 February 2022.
  9. 1 2 @ecoosfera (19 October 2020). "Nemonte Nenquimo, la líder indígena ambiental, envía un mensaje a la civilización..." Ecoosfera (in Mexican Spanish). Retrieved 17 February 2022.
  10. ↑ Blasco, Lucia (1 December 2020). "Nemonte Nenquimo: "No esperen que sólo los pueblos indígenas defendamos la Amazonía, es una lucha de todos"".
  11. 1 2 Environment, U. N. (9 December 2020). "Nemonte Nenquimo". Champions of the Earth. Retrieved 17 February 2022.
  12. 1 2 3 Riederer, Rachel (15 May 2019). "An Uncommon Victory for an Indigenous Tribe in the Amazon". The New Yorker.
  13. ↑ Chandler, Mark (24 June 2021). "Wildfire signs rainforest campaigner Nenquimo's 'clarion call'" . Retrieved 16 February 2022.
  14. 1 2 "We Will Not Be Saved by Nemonte Nenquimo | WHSmith". 'WHSmith. Retrieved 17 February 2022.
  15. ↑ "BBC 100 Women 2020: Who is on the list this year?". BBC News. 23 November 2020. Retrieved 23 November 2020.
  16. ↑ "Nemonte Nenquimo". www.rewild.org. Retrieved 17 February 2022.
  17. ↑ "Nemonte Nenquimo". Goldman Environmental Prize . Retrieved 6 December 2020.
  18. ↑ "The Goldman environmental prize winners 2020 – in pictures". The Guardian . 30 November 2020. Retrieved 6 December 2020.
  19. ↑ Buschschlüter, Vanessa (30 November 2020). "Nemonte Nenquimo: The indigenous leader named 'environmental hero'". BBC News . Retrieved 6 December 2020.
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